U.S. patent number 10,284,542 [Application Number 14/832,250] was granted by the patent office on 2019-05-07 for intelligent certificate discovery in physical and virtualized networks.
This patent grant is currently assigned to International Business Machines Corporation. The grantee listed for this patent is International Business Machines Corporation. Invention is credited to Thomas H. Benjamin, Steven E. T. Hikida, John T. Peck, Bruce A. Rich, Richard L. Robinson.
United States Patent |
10,284,542 |
Benjamin , et al. |
May 7, 2019 |
Intelligent certificate discovery in physical and virtualized
networks
Abstract
Mechanisms are provided, in a communication device associated
with a first computing device, for capturing security data
exchanged between the first computing device and a second computing
device. The mechanisms receive a data message from either the first
computing device or the second computing device. The data message
is part of an operation for establishing a secure communication
connection between the first computing device and the second
computing device. The mechanisms filter the received data message
for security data passed in the received data message and mirror
the security data to an analysis port of the communication device.
Moreover, the mechanisms output, via the analysis port, the
security data to a data collection and analysis system that
analyzes the security data with regard to security requirement
compliance.
Inventors: |
Benjamin; Thomas H. (Cedar
Park, TX), Hikida; Steven E. T. (Markham, CA),
Peck; John T. (Liberty Hill, TX), Rich; Bruce A. (Cedar
Park, TX), Robinson; Richard L. (Broomfield, CO) |
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
International Business Machines Corporation |
Armonk |
NY |
US |
|
|
Assignee: |
International Business Machines
Corporation (Armonk, NY)
|
Family
ID: |
58158340 |
Appl.
No.: |
14/832,250 |
Filed: |
August 21, 2015 |
Prior Publication Data
|
|
|
|
Document
Identifier |
Publication Date |
|
US 20170054709 A1 |
Feb 23, 2017 |
|
Current U.S.
Class: |
1/1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
H04L
63/1408 (20130101); H04L 63/0823 (20130101) |
Current International
Class: |
H04L
29/06 (20060101) |
References Cited
[Referenced By]
U.S. Patent Documents
Foreign Patent Documents
Other References
"High Performance Browser Networking: Chapter 4. Transport Layer
Security (TLS)", O'Reilly Media, Inc.,
http://chimera.labs.oreilly.com/books/1230000000545/ch04.html#TLS_HANDSHA-
KE, accessed on the internet on Jun. 3, 2015, 14 pages. cited by
applicant .
Singh, Shashank, "Catalyst Switched Port Analyzer (SPAN)
Configuration Example", Cisco, Document ID: 10570, Apr. 21, 2014;
accessed on the internet on Aug. 20, 2015;
http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/docs/switches/catalyst-6500-series-s-
witches/10570-41.pdf, 38 pages. cited by applicant .
Thompson, Mary R. et al., "Certificate-Based Authorization Policy
in a PKI Environment", ACM Transactions on Information and System
Security, vol. 6, No. 4, Nov. 2003, pp. 566-588. cited by
applicant.
|
Primary Examiner: Zand; Kambiz
Assistant Examiner: Sherkat; Arezoo
Attorney, Agent or Firm: Tkacs; Stephen R. Walder, Jr.;
Stephen J. LaBaw; Jeffrey S.
Claims
What is claimed is:
1. A method, in a switch device associated with a first computing
device, for capturing security data exchanged between the first
computing device and a second computing device, the method
comprising: receiving, in a first port of the switch device, a data
message from either the first computing device or the second
computing device to be passed from the first port of the switch
device to a second port of the switch device, wherein the data
message is part of an operation for establishing a secure
communication connection between the first computing device and the
second computing device; filtering, by a switched port analyzer
implemented within the switch device, the received data message to
identify security certificate data passed in the received data
message, wherein filtering the received data message comprises:
analyzing a traffic flow of data traffic through the switch device
by implementing logic within the switch device to identify patterns
of data messages passed between the first computing device and the
second computing device corresponding to types of communications
used to establish secure communication connections; identifying, by
the switched port analyzer, the received data message as a message
that is part of the operation for establishing the secure
communication connection in response to the received data message
being identified by the logic as being a communication used to
establish a secure communication connection; and extracting, by the
switched port analyzer, the security certificate data from the
received data message; mirroring, by the switched port analyzer,
the extracted security certificate data to an analysis port of the
switch device; and outputting, by the switch device via the
analysis port, the extracted security certificate data to a data
collection and analysis system that analyzes the extracted security
certificate data with regard to security requirement
compliance.
2. The method of claim 1, wherein e analysis port is one of a
physical port of the switch device or a virtualized port of the
switch device.
3. The method of claim 1, wherein mirroring the extracted security
certificate data to an analysis port of the switch device comprises
mirroring the extracted security certificate data to the analysis
port without mirroring non-identified data messages.
4. The method of claim 1, wherein the switch device is physically
coupled to one of the first computing device or the second
computing device.
5. The method of claim 1, wherein the first computing device is a
server computing device and the second computing device is a client
computing device.
6. The method of claim 5, wherein the security certificate data
comprises an unencrypted security certificate, and wherein the
unencrypted security certificate is a security certificate of the
client computing device passed in the received data message as part
of a traffic flow from the client computing device to the server
computing device, and wherein the unencrypted security certificate
comprises information identifying one or more of key lengths, key
algorithms, issuing authority, assertions about appropriate usage
of the unencrypted security certificate from the issuing authority,
not-valid-before and not-valid-after dates/times, or chain of trust
for the issuing authority.
7. The method of claim 5, wherein the data message is part of an
ingress traffic flow from the client computing device to the server
computing device.
8. The method of claim 5, wherein the data message is part of one
of an ingress traffic flow from the client computing device to the
server computing device or an egress traffic flow from the server
computing device to the client computing device, and wherein the
switch device monitors both ingress traffic flows and egress
traffic flows for data messages having security certificate
data.
9. The method of claim 1, wherein the security certificate data
comprises an unencrypted security certificate, a timestamp
associated with the received message, and information regarding the
sender or receiver of the message.
10. The method of claim 1, further comprising: analyzing, by the
data collection and analysis system, the security certificate data
to identify at least one of certificate usage trends, risky
certificate analytics, or security alert trigger analytics;
comparing results of the analysis with one or more security
compliance requirements; and determining whether or not the one or
more compliance requirements are met by the secure communication
connection.
11. A computer program product comprising a computer readable
storage medium having a computer readable program stored therein,
wherein the computer readable program, when executed on a switch
device, causes the switch device to: receive, in a first port of
the switch device, a data message from either a first computing
device or a second computing device to be passed from the first
port of the switch device to a second port of the switch device,
wherein the data message is part of an operation for establishing a
secure communication connection between the first computing device
and the second computing device; filter, by a switched port
analyzer implemented within the switch device, the received data
message to identify security data passed in the received data
message, wherein filtering the received data message comprises:
analyzing a traffic flow of data traffic through the switch device
by implementing logic within the switch device to identify patterns
of data messages passed between the first computing device and the
second computing device corresponding to types of communications
used to establish secure communication connections; identifying, by
the switched port analyzer, the received data message as a message
that is part of the operation for establishing the secure
communication connection in response to the received data message
being identified by the logic as being a communication used to
establish a secure communication connection; and extracting, by the
switched port analyzer, security certificate data from the received
data message; mirror, by the switched port analyzer, the extracted
security certificate data to an analysis port of the switch device;
and output, by the switch device via the analysis port, the
extracted security certificate data to a data collection and
analysis system that analyzes the extracted security certificate
data with regard to security requirement compliance.
12. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein the analysis
port is one of a physical port of the switch device or a
virtualized port of the switch device.
13. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein mirroring the
extracted security certificate data to an analysis port of the
switch device comprises mirroring the extracted security
certificate data to the analysis port without mirroring
non-identified data messages.
14. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein the switch
device is physically coupled to one of the first computing device
or the second computing device.
15. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein the first
computing device is a server computing device and the second
computing device is a client computing device.
16. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the extracted
security certificate data comprises an unencrypted security
certificate, and wherein the unencrypted security certificate is a
security certificate of the client computing device passed in the
received data message as part of a traffic flow from the client
computing device to the server computing device, and wherein the
unencrypted security certificate comprises information identifying
one or more of key lengths, key algorithms, issuing authority,
assertions about appropriate usage of the unencrypted security
certificate from the issuing authority, not-valid-before and
not-valid-after dates/times, or chain of trust for the issuing
authority.
17. The computer program product of claim 15, wherein the data
message is part of an ingress traffic flow from the client
computing device to the server computing device.
18. The computer program product ref claim 15, wherein the data
message is part of one of an ingress traffic flow from the client
computing device to the server computing device or an egress
traffic flow from the server computing device to the client
computing device, and wherein the switch device monitors both
ingress traffic flows and egress traffic flows for data messages
having security data.
19. The computer program product of claim 11, wherein the extracted
security certificate data comprises an unencrypted security
certificate, a timestamp associated with the received message, and
information regarding the sender or receiver of the message.
20. A switch device comprising: a switched port analyzer; a first
port; a second port; and an analysis port, wherein the switch
device processes data message traffic flows to and from a plurality
of computing devices, and wherein the switched port analyzer
comprises logic configured to: receive, by the switched port
analyzer from the first port, a data message from either a first
computing device or a second computing device to be passed from the
first port to the second port, wherein the data message is part of
an operation for establishing a secure communication connection
between the first computing device and the second computing device;
filter, by the switched port analyzer, the received data message to
identify security certificate data passed in the received data
message, wherein filtering the received data message comprises:
analyzing a traffic flow of data traffic through the switch device
by implementing logic within the switch device to identify patterns
of data messages passed between the first computing device and the
second computing device corresponding to types of communications
used to establish secure communication connections; identifying the
received data message as a message that is part of the operation
for establishing the secure communication connection in response to
the received data message being identified by the logic as being a
communication used to establish a secure communication connection;
and extracting, by the switched port analyzer, the security
certificate data from the received data message; mirror, by the
switched port analyzer, the extracted security certificate data to
the analysis port; and output, via the analysis port, the extracted
security certificate data to a data collection and analysis system
that analyzes the extracted security certificate data with regard
to security requirement compliance.
Description
BACKGROUND
The present application relates generally to an improved data
processing apparatus and method and more specifically to mechanisms
for intelligent certificate discovery in physical and virtualized
networks.
The modern Internet economy has developed around secure, encrypted
transmissions, originally web browser-driven, but now application
driven. These secure, encrypted transmissions usually employ
Hypertext Transport Protocol (HTTP) over Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)
or Transport Layer Security (TLS). Such protocols rely on Public
Key Infrastructure (PKI) for the initial exchange of information
which leads to a high performance secure connection that shields
sensitive private information from unintended parties. PKI in turn
relies on an asymmetric key pair association where a public key is
exposed to the world through a certificate (usually in X.509
format) issued by a well-known certificate authority. The
corresponding private key remains hidden from all other parties
except the owner of the private key. The certificate includes
information about the public key, information about the identity of
the owner of the public key, and a digital signature of an entity
that has verified that the contents of the certificate are correct
(referred to as the "issuer" of the certificate). In the X.509
format, for example, the certificate includes the following
information: Serial Number: Used to uniquely identify the
certificate Subject: The person or entity identified Signature
Algorithm: The algorithm used to create the signature Signature:
The actual signature to very that the certificate came from the
issuer Issuer: The entity that verified the information and issued
the certificate Valid-From (Not-Before): The date the certificate
is first valid from Valid-To (Not-After): The expiration date
Key-Usage: Purpose of the public key (e.g., encipherment,
signature, certificate signing, etc.) Public Key: The public key
Public Key Algorithm: The algorithm used to generate the Public Key
Thumbprint Algorithm: The algorithm used to hash the public key
certificate Thumbprint (also known as fingerprint): The hash
itself, used as an abbreviated form of the public key
certificate
The strength of this key pair is based partially on the algorithm
in which the keys are intended to be used, as well as the length of
the keys themselves. Such information is readily available in the
certificate along with assertions regarding the appropriate usage
of the certificate from the issuing authority, e.g., assertions of
"not-valid-before" and "not-valid-after" timestamps, the chain of
trust for the issuing authority itself, and the like, as
illustrated above with regard to the X.509 format. All such
information in the certificate should be examined before a client
computing device extends its trust to the server associated with
the certificate, or vice versa. However, many client side users and
server side commercial applications fail to adequately check this
information. Moreover, the National Institute of Standards and
Technology (NIST) has published guidelines for the United States of
America federal government sector dictating what key sizes and
algorithms are permissible for usage by federal installations.
Similar restrictions apply in the commercial sector as well,
whether by companies voluntarily adhering to the NIST guidelines or
being forced by compliance requirements from regulating bodies,
such as Health Insurance Portability and Accountability (HIPPA) or
Peripheral Component Interconnect/Data Security Standard (PCI/DSS)
regulating bodies, among others.
SUMMARY
In one illustrative embodiment, a method is provided, in a
communication device associated with a first computing device, for
capturing security data exchanged between the first computing
device and a second computing device. The method comprises
receiving, in the communication device, a data message from either
the first computing device or the second computing device. The data
message is part of an operation for establishing a secure
communication connection between the first computing device and the
second computing device. The method further comprises filtering, by
the communication device, the received data message for security
data passed in the received data message and mirroring, by the
communication device, the security data to an analysis port of the
communication device. Moreover, the method comprises outputting, by
the communication device, via the analysis port, the security data
to a data collection and analysis system that analyzes the security
data with regard to security requirement compliance.
In other illustrative embodiments, a computer program product
comprising a computer useable or readable medium having a computer
readable program is provided. The computer readable program, when
executed on a computing device, causes the computing device to
perform various ones of, and combinations of, the operations
outlined above with regard to the method illustrative
embodiment.
In yet another illustrative embodiment, a system/apparatus is
provided. The system/apparatus may comprise one or more processors
and a memory coupled to the one or more processors. The memory may
comprise instructions which, when executed by the one or more
processors, cause the one or more processors to perform various
ones of, and combinations of, the operations outlined above with
regard to the method illustrative embodiment.
These and other features and advantages of the present invention
will be described in, or will become apparent to those of ordinary
skill in the art in view of, the following detailed description of
the example embodiments of the present invention.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The invention, as well as a preferred mode of use and further
objectives and advantages thereof, will best be understood by
reference to the following detailed description of illustrative
embodiments when read in conjunction with the accompanying
drawings, wherein:
FIG. 1 is an example diagram of a distributed data processing
system in which aspects of the illustrative embodiments may be
implemented;
FIG. 2 is an example block diagram of a computing device in which
aspects of the illustrative embodiments may be implemented;
FIG. 3 is an example block diagram of primary operational elements
of one example implementation in accordance with one illustrative
embodiment;
FIG. 4 is an example diagram of a handshake operation in accordance
with the TLS protocol;
FIG. 5 is a flowchart outlining an example operation of a switched
port analyzer in a switch in accordance with one illustrative
embodiment; and
FIG. 6 is a flowchart of a system for collecting security data from
an analysis port of a switch and determining compliance of a
computing system based on the collected security data in accordance
with one illustrative embodiment.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
The illustrative embodiments provide mechanisms for intelligent
certificate discovery in physical and virtualized networks. As
noted above, various standards requirements have been placed on
institutions to ensure security of their electronic communications.
Given the need for compliance with these established standards,
various products have been devised to probe an installation's
infrastructure so that a company can prove such compliance to
auditors. Such products usually present themselves as TLS clients,
attempting handshakes with specified hosts computing systems on
particular ports. This process is very intrusive and may require
reconfiguration every time a new service comes online or the
network topology of the infrastructure changes. If the installation
also has network monitoring software/intrusion protection systems
that detect attempted break-ins, and most do have such systems,
this intrusive client-initiated TLS probing will set off the alarms
and protections provided by these networking monitoring
software/intrusion protection systems as such intrusions look
suspiciously like a port-scan attack.
The illustrative embodiments provide a non-intrusive security
monitoring solution that does not require active probing of an
institution's networked machines or ongoing modifications to
maintain the monitoring capabilities. The mechanisms of the
illustrative embodiments implement data capture via an analysis
port on switches of the network infrastructure. The analysis port
may be physical or virtualized such that the non-invasive security
data capturing and analysis mechanisms of the illustrative
embodiments may be used with physical and virtualized networks. The
data that is captured is the security data, e.g., Public Key
Infrastructure (PKI) data, Secure Shell (SSH) data, or the like,
from handshake communications between two computing devices.
Typically, this data may be provided in the form of a certificate,
but the illustrative embodiments are not limited to only operation
with certificates and may operate with regard to any identifiable
security data passed as part of a handshake or connection
initiation communication. This security data may comprise, for
example, key lengths, signature types, and algorithms, all of which
are passed "in the clear," i.e. without encryption, between the
computing devices. This data is filtered out of the other traffic
flowing through one or more of the switches of the infrastructure,
by logic implemented in the switches, and sent to the analysis port
for capturing. The captured data is then stored and may be accessed
by an external system for analysis to evaluate proper/improper
usage of security standards by the computing devices involved in
the communications.
For example, a switch associated with a server may be configured to
implement the logic of the illustrative embodiments and may be
configured with a physical or virtual analysis port for use with
the logic of the illustrative embodiments. The logic of the switch
monitors the data traffic (or simply "traffic") flowing through the
switch for patterns of data, field values in headers, tags, or any
other identifier of handshake communications or communications
associated with the establishment of a secure connection (hereafter
referred to as a "handshake" communication) between the server and
another external computing device (assumed hereafter to be the
"client" computing device to the server computing device). The
logic of the switch, in response to identifying a data
communication flowing through the switch either to, or from, the
server, as being a handshake communication, extracts or captures
security data in the communication for which analysis is
desired.
In the illustrative embodiments described herein, this security
data comprises security certificate data, timestamp information
associated with the communication from which the security
certificate data was obtained, as well as any other suitable
information for identifying the source of the communication, the
destination of the communication, and the like. This information
may be extracted by the logic of the switch after the identified
data communications are mirrored to the analysis port, and either
stored in a storage device of the switch or otherwise output to an
external analysis computing device/system where this information
may be stored and analyzed.
In some illustrative embodiments, the analysis that is performed on
the captured security data may be categorized into three primary
categories: (1) Certificate Usage Trends for Servers and Clients;
(2) Risky Certificate Analytics; and (3) security alert Trigger
Analytics. With regard to Certificate Usage Trends for Servers and
Clients, various analytics may be performed directed to determining
the frequency of use of certificates, temporal use patterns
including night, daytime, and particular hours of use, most
frequently used certificates, duplication of certificates,
changes/trends in certificate issuer adoption, and certificate
strength. Regarding the Risky Certificate Analytics, various
analytics may be performed directed to determining the user of
certificates from issuers that have high revocation rates, use of
certificates from issuers that have been assigned a low reputation
rating, use of certificate mechanisms that have invalid or
non-existent revocation checking mechanisms, and overuse, reuse, or
sharing of a certificate by multiple entities (client computing
devices or servers). With regard to Trigger Analytics, various
analytics may be performed directed to determining each use of a
client or server certificate that is known to be revoked, each use
of a certificate that is from an unauthorized issuer, use or reuse
of a client certificate that is self-signed, use of a certificate
that has never been seen previously on the network, use of a
certificate from a certificate issuer that has never been seen
previously on the network, and trusting a certificate from a server
outside the enterprise that is using an untrusted, revoked, risky,
unauthorized, or weak certificate, i.e. creating a secure tunnel to
an external web server to send stolen data.
The analysis is performed by a data collection and analysis system
that obtains the security data from the switch, e.g., via the
analysis port of the switch. The data collection and analysis
system may perform one or more analysis operations to generate a
result which is then provided to a compliance auditing system. The
compliance auditing system compares the results generated by the
data collection and analysis system to a set of compliance
requirements to determine if the data communications exchanged with
the computing device, e.g., server, meet the compliance
requirements or not. The results of this comparison are stored
and/or used to generate reports, notifications, or other output to
inform an authorized user of the degree of compliance of the
computing device with the compliance requirements. While the data
collection and analysis system and compliance auditing system are
described separately, they may in fact be integrated with one
another such that a single system collects the security data from
the switch, analyzes it, and compares it to compliance
requirements, without departing from the spirit and scope of the
illustrative embodiments.
It should be appreciated that these operations of collecting
security data from switches, analyzing the collected security data,
and comparing the results of the analysis to compliance
requirements may be performed for a plurality of computing devices
with the results of these operations being aggregated to generate
an overall report, notification, or other output that covers the
plurality of computing devices. For example, such operations may be
performed for computing devices across an enterprise, an entire
company, or at least a portion of the enterprise, e.g., a division
within a company. As such, the computing devices may be widely
distributed and connected via one or more networks with the data
collection, analysis, and compliance auditing operations being
provided via a centralized computing system. Alternatively, such
operations may be distributed to various portions of the enterprise
with each performing such operations for their own individual
division, optionally with additional centralized collection,
analysis, and compliance auditing being done across divisions at a
centralized computing system. Any architecture that facilitates the
collection of security data from switches in the manner of the
illustrative embodiments, analysis of such collected security data,
and compliance auditing based on the results of the analysis may be
used without departing from the spirit and scope of the
illustrative embodiments.
It should be appreciated that the mechanisms of the illustrative
embodiments operate on both ingress and egress traffic of a server
computing device or client computing device with which the switch
is associated. That is, in a client-server connection establishment
via handshake operations of a secure communication protocol, the
mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments capture the security
data, e.g., certificates, of both the client and the server. In
known probe based mechanisms, capturing client certificates is not
possible, as all the internet architectures work together to
protect the clients. For example, all of the secure-exchange
protocols (e.g., Transport Layer Security (TLS)) start with the
client initiating the sequence without presenting any credentials
and the server responding by sending its certificate(s). None of
the known secure-exchange protocols allow servers to unilaterally
reach out to clients and discover features about them. TCP-based
protocols all start with the client issuing a SYN packet to the
server, the server responding with an ACK, and the exchange of
information following an assertion of the two machines with regard
to their respective roles. Furthermore, the Internet is wired to
facilitate client-to-server flows, with firewall rules such that
servers are accessible and non-servers are not. Such protection
even extends through the naming of endpoints and the assignment of
internet addresses, where servers will be at predictably-fixed
names or static IP addresses and clients get dynamic IP addresses,
which are much harder to locate and somewhat shielded from constant
attack. All of these protections and protocols are specifically
designed such that client certificate capturing is not
possible.
To the contrary, the illustrative embodiments, through capturing of
the security data as part of the handshake operation, are able to
identify the choices of security mechanisms negotiated between the
client and the server. This provides a much richer set of data that
allows for more nuanced analysis of the cryptographic mechanisms of
the secure connections which in turn realizes the enterprise goal
of proving full compliance to auditors and evaluators.
In addition, as noted above, temporal information about the
negotiation of the secure connection as part of the handshake
operation may be captured along with the security data. This
temporal information allows for temporal analysis as an additional
dimension of data analysis in that the analysis mechanisms will be
able to know when certain communication sessions happened as well
as being provided with information for determining how many
communication sessions occurred over a particular sampling period.
All together, the security data, entity information, and temporal
information gathered by the mechanisms of the illustrative
embodiments in a non-intrusive manner provide a superior data pool
on which to perform analysis. As a result, the analysis mechanisms
of the illustrative embodiments provide a more thorough and
informative analysis than is generally available using known
invasive probing mechanisms.
Before beginning the discussion of the various aspects of the
illustrative embodiments, it should first be appreciated that
throughout this description the term "mechanism" will be used to
refer to elements of the present invention that perform various
operations, functions, and the like. A "mechanism," as the term is
used herein, may be an implementation of the functions or aspects
of the illustrative embodiments in the form of an apparatus, a
procedure, or a computer program product. In the case of a
procedure, the procedure is implemented by one or more devices,
apparatus, computers, data processing systems, or the like. In the
case of a computer program product, the logic represented by
computer code or instructions embodied in or on the computer
program product is executed by one or more hardware devices in
order to implement the functionality or perform the operations
associated with the specific "mechanism." Thus, the mechanisms
described herein may be implemented as specialized hardware,
software executing on general purpose hardware, software
instructions stored on a medium such that the instructions are
readily executable by specialized or general purpose hardware, a
procedure or method for executing the functions, or a combination
of any of the above.
The present description and claims may make use of the terms "a",
"at least one of", and "one or more of" with regard to particular
features and elements of the illustrative embodiments. It should be
appreciated that these terms and phrases are intended to state that
there is at least one of the particular feature or element present
in the particular illustrative embodiment, but that more than one
can also be present. That is, these terms/phrases are not intended
to limit the description or claims to a single feature/element
being present or require that a plurality of such features/elements
be present. To the contrary, these terms/phrases only require at
least a single feature/element with the possibility of a plurality
of such features/elements being within the scope of the description
and claims.
In addition, it should be appreciated that the following
description uses a plurality of various examples for various
elements of the illustrative embodiments to further illustrate
example implementations of the illustrative embodiments and to aid
in the understanding of the mechanisms of the illustrative
embodiments. These examples intended to be non-limiting and are not
exhaustive of the various possibilities for implementing the
mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments. It will be apparent to
those of ordinary skill in the art in view of the present
description that there are many other alternative implementations
for these various elements that may be utilized in addition to, or
in replacement of, the examples provided herein without departing
from the spirit and scope of the present invention.
The present invention may be a system, a method, and/or a computer
program product. The computer program product may include a
computer readable storage medium (or media) having computer
readable program instructions thereon for causing a processor to
carry out aspects of the present invention.
The computer readable storage medium can be a tangible device that
can retain and store instructions for use by an instruction
execution device. The computer readable storage medium may be, for
example, but is not limited to, an electronic storage device, a
magnetic storage device, an optical storage device, an
electromagnetic storage device, a semiconductor storage device, or
any suitable combination of the foregoing. A non-exhaustive list of
more specific examples of the computer readable storage medium
includes the following: a portable computer diskette, a hard disk,
a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable
programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), a static
random access memory (SRAM), a portable compact disc read-only
memory (CD-ROM), a digital versatile disk (DVD), a memory stick, a
floppy disk, a mechanically encoded device such as punch-cards or
raised structures in a groove having instructions recorded thereon,
and any suitable combination of the foregoing. A computer readable
storage medium, as used herein, is not to be construed as being
transitory signals per se, such as radio waves or other freely
propagating electromagnetic waves, electromagnetic waves
propagating through a waveguide or other transmission media (e.g.,
light pulses passing through a fiber-optic cable), or electrical
signals transmitted through a wire.
Computer readable program instructions described herein can be
downloaded to respective computing/processing devices from a
computer readable storage medium or to an external computer or
external storage device via a network, for example, the Internet, a
local area network, a wide area network and/or a wireless network.
The network may comprise copper transmission cables, optical
transmission fibers, wireless transmission, routers, firewalls,
switches, gateway computers and/or edge servers. A network adapter
card or network interface in each computing/processing device
receives computer readable program instructions from the network
and forwards the computer readable program instructions for storage
in a computer readable storage medium within the respective
computing/processing device.
Computer readable program instructions for carrying out operations
of the present invention may be assembler instructions,
instruction-set-architecture (ISA) instructions, machine
instructions, machine dependent instructions, microcode, firmware
instructions, state-setting data, or either source code or object
code written in any combination of one or more programming
languages, including an object oriented programming language such
as Java, Smalltalk, C++ or the like, and conventional procedural
programming languages, such as the "C" programming language or
similar programming languages. The computer readable program
instructions may execute entirely on the user's computer, partly on
the user's computer, as a stand-alone software package, partly on
the user's computer and partly on a remote computer or entirely on
the remote computer or server. In the latter scenario, the remote
computer may be connected to the user's computer through any type
of network, including a local area network (LAN) or a wide area
network (WAN), or the connection may be made to an external
computer (for example, through the Internet using an Internet
Service Provider). In some embodiments, electronic circuitry
including, for example, programmable logic circuitry,
field-programmable gate arrays (FPGA), or programmable logic arrays
(PLA) may execute the computer readable program instructions by
utilizing state information of the computer readable program
instructions to personalize the electronic circuitry, in order to
perform aspects of the present invention.
Aspects of the present invention are described herein with
reference to flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams of
methods, apparatus (systems), and computer program products
according to embodiments of the invention. It will be understood
that each block of the flowchart illustrations and/or block
diagrams, and combinations of blocks in the flowchart illustrations
and/or block diagrams, can be implemented by computer readable
program instructions.
These computer readable program instructions may be provided to a
processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer,
or other programmable data processing apparatus to produce a
machine, such that the instructions, which execute via the
processor of the computer or other programmable data processing
apparatus, create means for implementing the functions/acts
specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.
These computer readable program instructions may also be stored in
a computer readable storage medium that can direct a computer, a
programmable data processing apparatus, and/or other devices to
function in a particular manner, such that the computer readable
storage medium having instructions stored therein comprises an
article of manufacture including instructions which implement
aspects of the function/act specified in the flowchart and/or block
diagram block or blocks.
The computer readable program instructions may also be loaded onto
a computer, other programmable data processing apparatus, or other
device to cause a series of operational steps to be performed on
the computer, other programmable apparatus or other device to
produce a computer implemented process, such that the instructions
which execute on the computer, other programmable apparatus, or
other device implement the functions/acts specified in the
flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.
The flowchart and block diagrams in the Figures illustrate the
architecture, functionality, and operation of possible
implementations of systems, methods, and computer program products
according to various embodiments of the present invention. In this
regard, each block in the flowchart or block diagrams may represent
a module, segment, or portion of instructions, which comprises one
or more executable instructions for implementing the specified
logical function(s). In some alternative implementations, the
functions noted in the block may occur out of the order noted in
the figures. For example, two blocks shown in succession may, in
fact, be executed substantially concurrently, or the blocks may
sometimes be executed in the reverse order, depending upon the
functionality involved. It will also be noted that each block of
the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, and combinations
of blocks in the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, can
be implemented by special purpose hardware-based systems that
perform the specified functions or acts or carry out combinations
of special purpose hardware and computer instructions.
As noted above, the mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments
operate to collect security data from secure connection initiation
messages, e.g., handshake messages, exchanged between computing
devices. The illustrative embodiments utilize logic provided in one
or more switches associated with the computing devices to identify
secure connection initiation messages, mirror those messages to an
analysis port, and then output the message data to an analysis
system. This identification of secure connection initiation
messages may be performed with regard to both ingress and egress
data flows, e.g., data flows to a server originating from a client
computer and data flows originating from the server and flowing to
the client computer. The illustrative embodiments further provide
mechanisms for analyzing this security data to determine analytics
that may then be compared to security compliance requirements to
ensure that the computing devices involved in the secure connection
are complying with these requirements. Corresponding actions may
then be taken, such as generating and outputting reports,
generating and outputting notifications, terminating connections,
recording additional data for monitoring the connection, or the
like.
Thus, the illustrative embodiments may be utilized in many
different types of data processing environments in which multiple
computing devices are communicating with one another via secure
communication connections. This will typically be a distributed
data processing system environment in which one or more data
networks are provided, but is not limited to such and any
connection between at least two computing devices may utilize the
mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments. In order to provide a
context for the description of the specific elements and
functionality of the illustrative embodiments, FIGS. 1 and 2 are
provided hereafter as example environments in which aspects of the
illustrative embodiments may be implemented. It should be
appreciated that FIGS. 1 and 2 are only examples and are not
intended to assert or imply any limitation with regard to the
environments in which aspects or embodiments of the present
invention may be implemented. Many modifications to the depicted
environments may be made without departing from the spirit and
scope of the present invention.
FIG. 1 depicts a pictorial representation of an example distributed
data processing system in which aspects of the illustrative
embodiments may be implemented. Distributed data processing system
100 may include a network of computers in which aspects of the
illustrative embodiments may be implemented. The distributed data
processing system 100 contains at least one network 102, which is
the medium used to provide communication links between various
devices and computers connected together within distributed data
processing system 100. The network 102 may include connections,
such as wire, wireless communication links, or fiber optic
cables.
In the depicted example, server 104 and server 106 are connected to
network 102 along with storage unit 108. In addition, clients 110,
112, and 114 are also connected to network 102. These clients 110,
112, and 114 may be, for example, personal computers, network
computers, or the like. In the depicted example, server 104
provides data, such as boot files, operating system images, and
applications to the clients 110, 112, and 114. Clients 110, 112,
and 114 are clients to server 104 in the depicted example.
Distributed data processing system 100 may include additional
servers, clients, and other devices not shown.
In the depicted example, distributed data processing system 100 is
the Internet with network 102 representing a worldwide collection
of networks and gateways that use the Transmission Control
Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) suite of protocols to
communicate with one another. At the heart of the Internet is a
backbone of high-speed data communication lines between major nodes
or host computers, consisting of thousands of commercial,
governmental, educational and other computer systems that route
data and messages. Of course, the distributed data processing
system 100 may also be implemented to include a number of different
types of networks, such as for example, an intranet, a local area
network (LAN), a wide area network (WAN), or the like. As stated
above, FIG. 1 is intended as an example, not as an architectural
limitation for different embodiments of the present invention, and
therefore, the particular elements shown in FIG. 1 should not be
considered limiting with regard to the environments in which the
illustrative embodiments of the present invention may be
implemented.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an example data processing system in
which aspects of the illustrative embodiments may be implemented.
Data processing system 200 is an example of a computer, such as
client 110 in FIG. 1, in which computer usable code or instructions
implementing the processes for illustrative embodiments of the
present invention may be located.
In the depicted example, data processing system 200 employs a hub
architecture including north bridge and memory controller hub
(NB/MCH) 202 and south bridge and input/output (I/O) controller hub
(SB/ICH) 204. Processing unit 206, main memory 208, and graphics
processor 210 are connected to NB/MCH 202. Graphics processor 210
may be connected to NB/MCH 202 through an accelerated graphics port
(AGP).
In the depicted example, local area network (LAN) adapter 212
connects to SB/ICH 204. Audio adapter 216, keyboard and mouse
adapter 220, modem 222, read only memory (ROM) 224, hard disk drive
(HDD) 226, CD-ROM drive 230, universal serial bus (USB) ports and
other communication ports 232, and PCI/PCIe devices 234 connect to
SB/ICH 204 through bus 238 and bus 240. PCI/PCIe devices may
include, for example, Ethernet adapters, add-in cards, and PC cards
for notebook computers. PCI uses a card bus controller, while PCIe
does not. ROM 224 may be, for example, a flash basic input/output
system (BIOS).
HDD 226 and CD-ROM drive 230 connect to SB/ICH 204 through bus 240.
HDD 226 and CD-ROM drive 230 may use, for example, an integrated
drive electronics (IDE) or serial advanced technology attachment
(SATA) interface. Super I/O (SIO) device 236 may be connected to
SB/ICH 204.
An operating system runs on processing unit 206. The operating
system coordinates and provides control of various components
within the data processing system 200 in FIG. 2. As a client, the
operating system may be a commercially available operating system
such as Microsoft.RTM. Windows 7.RTM.. An object-oriented
programming system, such as the Java.TM. programming system, may
run in conjunction with the operating system and provides calls to
the operating system from Java.TM. programs or applications
executing on data processing system 200.
As a server, data processing system 200 may be, for example, an IBM
eServer.TM. System p.RTM. computer system, Power.TM. processor
based computer system, or the like, running the Advanced
Interactive Executive (AIX.RTM.) operating system or the LINUX.RTM.
operating system. Data processing system 200 may be a symmetric
multiprocessor (SMP) system including a plurality of processors in
processing unit 206. Alternatively, a single processor system may
be employed.
Instructions for the operating system, the object-oriented
programming system, and applications or programs are located on
storage devices, such as HDD 226, and may be loaded into main
memory 208 for execution by processing unit 206. The processes for
illustrative embodiments of the present invention may be performed
by processing unit 206 using computer usable program code, which
may be located in a memory such as, for example, main memory 208,
ROM 224, or in one or more peripheral devices 226 and 230, for
example.
A bus system, such as bus 238 or bus 240 as shown in FIG. 2, may be
comprised of one or more buses. Of course, the bus system may be
implemented using any type of communication fabric or architecture
that provides for a transfer of data between different components
or devices attached to the fabric or architecture. A communication
unit, such as modem 222 or network adapter 212 of FIG. 2, may
include one or more devices used to transmit and receive data. A
memory may be, for example, main memory 208, ROM 224, or a cache
such as found in NB/MCH 202 in FIG. 2.
Those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the
hardware in FIGS. 1 and 2 may vary depending on the implementation.
Other internal hardware or peripheral devices, such as flash
memory, equivalent non-volatile memory, or optical disk drives and
the like, may be used in addition to or in place of the hardware
depicted in FIGS. 1 and 2. Also, the processes of the illustrative
embodiments may be applied to a multiprocessor data processing
system, other than the SMP system mentioned previously, without
departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention.
Moreover, the data processing system 200 may take the form of any
of a number of different data processing systems including client
computing devices, server computing devices, a tablet computer,
laptop computer, telephone or other communication device, a
personal digital assistant (PDA), or the like. In some illustrative
examples, data processing system 200 may be a portable computing
device that is configured with flash memory to provide non-volatile
memory for storing operating system files and/or user-generated
data, for example. Essentially, data processing system 200 may be
any known or later developed data processing system without
architectural limitation.
The illustrative embodiments provide mechanisms for intelligent
security data collection and analysis in physical and virtualized
networks. In some illustrative embodiments, the security data that
is collected comprises security certificate information, source and
destination information, temporal information, and the like,
obtained from secure connection initiation messages passed between
at least two computing devices, e.g., a server and a client
computing device. To illustrate the operation of the mechanisms of
the illustrative embodiments in further detail, FIG. 3 is provided
hereafter which depicts the primary operational components for
establishing a secure communication connection and collecting and
analyzing security data in accordance with one illustrative
embodiment. For purposes of illustration only, it will be assumed
in the description of FIG. 3 and subsequent figures that the secure
communication connection is between a server and a client computing
device and that the secure communication connection is established
using a security protocol that requires a handshake operation,
e.g., SSL/TLS, in which certificate data is exchanged during the
negotiation of the secure communication connection performed via
the handshake operation. It should be appreciated that these
assumptions are to cover the most prevalent implementations of the
mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments, but that other
embodiments may utilize different mechanisms for establishment of
secure communication connections and the principles and mechanisms
of the illustrative embodiments are equally applicable to these
other implementations as well.
As shown in FIG. 3, the primary operational components of one
implementation of the illustrative embodiments comprises a server
310 and a client 320 communicating with one another via a network
305 and a switch 330. While a switch 330 is shown in FIG. 3, it
should be appreciated that the illustrative embodiments are not
limited to implementation within a switch 330 by may be implemented
in, or operate in conjunction with, other types of network data
traffic interface devices including routers, network adapters of
computing devices, or any other data traffic interface devices that
facilitate the establishment of secure communication connections
between a computing device and one or more other computing
devices.
As shown in FIG. 3, the switch 330 comprises a plurality of ports
332 for facilitating exchange of data between the server 310,
individual applications on the server 310, or the like, and other
devices communicatively coupled to the switch 330 via the network
305. The ports 332 may be physical ports of the switch 330 and/or
virtualized ports associated with one or more physical ports of the
switch 330. Port virtualization is generally known in the art and
thus, a more detailed explanation of virtual ports is not provided
herein. It should be appreciated that the mechanisms of the
illustrative embodiments may be utilized with either or both
physical and virtual ports.
In accordance with the mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments,
the switch 330 is configured with a switched port analyzer 334 and
analysis port 336. The analysis port 336 may be configured to be a
port to which security data passed between the ports 332, and
identified by the switched port analyzer 334 to be security data
for initialization of a secure communication connection, is
mirrored. In one illustrative embodiment, the analysis port 336 may
be configured in a similar manner to that of a Switch Port Analyzer
(SPAN) port or mirror port. In the illustrative embodiments, the
analysis port 336 is configured to work in conjunction with the
switched port analyzer 334 and receives and processes the data
specifically identified by the switched port analyzer 334 for
mirroring and output to the data collection and analysis
system.
Of particular importance, it should be appreciated that the
switched port analyzer 334 of the switch 330 comprises logic for
identifying specific types of communications flowing through the
switch and identifying particular types of data within these
identified communications for mirroring to the analysis port 336.
In particular, in some illustrative embodiments, the switched port
analyzer 334 analyzes the communications (the terms
"communications" and "messages" are used interchangeably herein to
refer to data communications exchanged via the switch) flowing
through the switch and determines, based on message identifiers,
pattern matching, metadata or data packet header information, or
any other identifier depending upon the particular protocols
utilized, if the communication is part of a negotiation, or
handshake, operation for establishing a secure communication
connection between two or more computing devices. In one
illustrative embodiment, a pattern of exchanged messages may be
identified that is indicative of a handshake operation, as will be
described in greater detail with regard to FIG. 4 hereafter. If the
identified pattern is determined to be present, then the messages
may be determined to be part of a handshake operation for
initiating a secure communication connection and the switched port
analyzer 334 may then monitor for a particular type, or types, of
messages that are known within the communication and security
protocols to have the security data that the switched port analyzer
334 is to extract and mirror to the analysis port 336, e.g., which
messages are likely to have the certificates exchanged between the
computing devices with these certificates and corresponding
temporal and sender/receiver information being mirrored to the
analysis port 336.
For example, assume an example of a TLS session establishment, or
handshake operation. According to the IETF RFC that documents the
TLS 1.2 protocol, the data packets for exchanging certificates are
marked with a HandshakeType of 1). When the server is sending its
certificate(s), the switch associated with the client would look
for that certificate packet in the data traffic flow between a
ServerHello message (packet with HandshakeType of 2) and
ServerHelloDone message (packet with HandshakeType of 12). When the
client is sending its certificate, the switch associated with the
server would look for that certificate packet in the data traffic
flow between a ClientHello message (packet with HandshakeType of 1)
and the conclusion of the handshake with a Finished message (packet
with HandshakeType of 20), followed by the ChangeCipherSpec
message.
If the switched port analyzer 334 identifies a communication
flowing through the switch 330 that is part of a handshake
operation or other negotiation to establish a secure communication
connection, the switched port analyzer 334 monitors the messages,
identifies the security data to be captured in the messages, and
mirrors the captured data to the analysis port 336. As noted above,
the security data that is captured is the security data, e.g.,
Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) data, Secure Shell (SSH) data, or
the like, from handshake communications between two computing
devices. Typically, this data may be provided in the form of a
certificate, such as the example certificate previously mentioned
above. Hence, in some illustrative embodiments, the security data
that is captured is the certificate data that is exchanged between
the two or more computing devices communicating via the switch 330
to establish the secure communication connection. This security
data, in the form of a certificate, may comprise information
identifying one or more of the key lengths, key algorithms, issuing
authority, assertions about appropriate usage of the certificate
from the issuing authority, not-valid-before and not-valid-after
dates/times, chain of trust for the issuing authority, and the
like.
This data is filtered out of the traffic flowing through the switch
330, via ports 332, by the logic of the switched port analyzer 334
and sent or mirrored to the analysis port 336 for capturing by the
data collection and analysis system 340. It should be appreciated
that this "filtering out" or mirroring of the selected security
data does not impede the handshake communications being passed
between the server 310 and the client 320 and this information is
still permitted to flow in messages exchanged between the server
310 and the client 320. Thus, the filtering or mirroring of this
security data is non-intrusive. The identification of the
particular security data to mirror comprises identifying a message,
in accordance with a known handshake or secure communication
connection initiation protocol, that the switched port analyzer 334
is configured to recognize, that stores the certificate or other
security data of interest. Based on monitoring of the traffic flows
by the switched port analyzer 334, in response to the switched port
analyzer 334 identifying such a message as having been received in
the switch, the message is analyzed to identify the portion of the
message containing the certificate and the certificate is mirrored
to the analysis port 336 along with other information about the
received message including a timestamp associated with the received
message or other temporal information, and information regarding
the sender/receiver of the message. In some illustrative
embodiments, in accordance with the particular protocols being
utilized, the certificate may be provided in a well known position
within the identified message and thus, the identification of the
certificate is straight-forward by extracting the certificate from
the known location within the message.
The selected security data, e.g., certificate, timestamp, and
sender/receiver identification, are mirrored to the analysis port
336 which sends the captured security data to the data collection
and analysis system 340 where the captured security data is stored
and able to be accessed by the data collection and analysis system
340 for analysis to evaluate proper/improper usage of security
standards by the computing devices involved in the communications.
In FIG. 3, the transfer of the capture data is shown as a dashed
line connecting the analysis port 336 and the data collection and
analysis system 340. It should be appreciated that this
transmission of data to the data collection and analysis system 340
may be performed via network 305, for example. Moreover, it should
be appreciated that the data collection and analysis system 340 may
obtain such captured data from a plurality of different switches
330 associated with different computing devices such analytics can
be generated for an aggregate of computing devices in addition to,
or alternative to, the analytics generated for a single computing
device, e.g., server 310.
The data collection and analysis system 340 stores and/or performs
analytical operations on the collected security data from the
switch 330 for one or more secure communication connections
established through the switch 330, i.e. based on the security data
exchanged by the sever 310 and the client 320, and/or other clients
(not shown). As noted above, the mechanisms of the illustrative
embodiments may be implemented with physical and/or virtual ports
and thus, the analysis may also be done with regard to physical
and/or virtual ports of the switch. With regard to virtualized
ports, it should be appreciated that the analysis may be performed
with regard to individual applications associated with the
virtualized ports, hosted on the server 310. Thus, the
sender/receiver information captured with the certificate
information and the temporal information may be used to identify
individual applications of the server 310, such as based on virtual
port identifier, when performing such analysis operations. In this
way, individual compliance of an application to security
requirements may be analyzed and corresponding reports,
notifications, and operations for termination of connections may be
performed on an individual application basis.
The analysis performed by the data collection and analysis system
340 may take many different forms and may be performed on an
individual computing device basis, an aggregate of collected
security data from a plurality of computing devices, such as across
an enterprise or a portion of an enterprise, may be performed on an
individual application or set of applications hosted by one or more
computing devices, or the like. The analysis performed by the data
collection and analysis system 340 preferably provides analytical
data and statistics that may be the basis for gauging compliance
with one or more security requirements, such as may be specified by
one or more security policies. These security policies may be
established by the enterprise, required by governmental
regulations, or otherwise established.
In some illustrative embodiments, the analysis that is performed on
the captured security data may be categorized into three primary
categories: (1) Certificate Usage Trends for Servers and Clients;
(2) Risky Certificate Analytics; and (3) Trigger Analytics. With
regard to Certificate Usage Trends for Servers and Clients, various
analytics may be performed directed to determining the frequency of
use of certificates, temporal use patterns including night,
daytime, and particular hours of use, most frequently used
certificates, duplication of certificates, changes/trends in
certificate issuer adoption, and certificate strength. Regarding
the Risky Certificate Analytics, various analytics may be performed
directed to determining the user of certificates from issuers that
have high revocation rates, use of certificates from issuers that
have been assigned a low reputation rating, use of certificate
mechanisms that have invalid or non-existent revocation checking
mechanisms, and overuse, reuse, or sharing of a certificate by
multiple entities (client computing devices or servers). With
regard to Trigger Analytics, various analytics may be performed
directed to determining each use of a client or server certificate
that is known to be revoked, each use of a certificate that is from
an unauthorized issuer, use or reuse of a client certificate that
is self-signed, use of a certificate that has never been seen
previously on the network, use of a certificate from a certificate
issuer that has never been seen previously on the network, and
trusting a certificate from a server outside the enterprise that is
using an untrusted, revoked, risky, unauthorized, or weak
certificate, i.e. creating a secure tunnel to an external web
server to send stolen data.
Analysis directed to determining statistics of frequency of use of
certificates may comprise maintaining counters in the data
collection and analysis system 340, over a predetermined period of
time, for each certificate of how often the certificate is used to
create a secure communication connection with the server 310. As
noted above, the certificates have unique identifiers and thus,
these unique identifiers may be associated with a counter value
that is incremented each time the certificate is detected and
captured by the switched port analyzer 334. Such counters may be
used as well, along with temporal information captured from the
communications in which the certificates were also captured, to
determine temporal use patterns for the particular certificates.
Such information may give insights into potential misuse and
exploitation of security lapses by the server 310 to gain access to
secure resources of the server 310 at the same or similar periods
of time of the day by the same source.
Similarly, such counters may be used to identify the most
frequently used certificates and duplication of certificates.
Certificates having the highest counter values, or values higher
than a given threshold, may be determined to be the most frequently
used certificates and may indicate potential intrusion by
individuals repeatedly attempting to connect to the server 310.
Duplication of certificates may be identified by analyzing the
collected security data for those certificates having a counter
value greater than 1, and looking at the identification of
sender/receiver to determine if the same certificate is being used
by more than one sender (client) or receiver (server). A duplicate
certificate may be a violation of an established security
requirement or policy since such duplicate may be indicative of a
misappropriation of the certificate by a user, manager, or
administrator within the organization or an intruder attempting to
falsify their identity on the network to gain access to servers or
networks. Regardless of the reason for the duplication, it is an
indication that further investigation is warranted.
With regard to identifying trends in issuer adoption, patterns of
collected security data may be analyzed to determine that at a
particular time, or at a regular basis, the issuer of certificates
is changed from one issuer to another, e.g., from Verisign.TM. to
GoDaddy.TM.. Counters may be established for each issuer, as
identified in the captured certificate information, to determine
how many certificates issued by the various issuers over a period
of time are used to establish communication connections via the
switch 330. This information may be compiled for a plurality of
time periods such that a trend is discernable through analysis.
Similarly, trends in certificate strength may be identified using
counters and temporal information for different types of
certificates, such as RSA 2048 and ECC 512, for example. Monitoring
such trends allows administrators and managers to assess the
overall improvement in strength and consistency of the use of
certificates throughout the network as they make changes to
policies and enforcement of those policies regarding the use of
certificates.
Regarding the identification of risky certificates, the identity of
the issuers of certificates captured over the predetermined time
period using the switched port analyzer 334 and data collection and
analysis system 340 may be used to identify if certificates posing
potential risk to the server 310 are being used to access secure
resources associated with the server 310. Because the mechanisms of
the illustrative embodiments capture the certificates passed as
part of the secure connection establishment process, and the
certificates include information about the issuer of the
certificate, this information may be correlated with issuer
information provided by one or more verification resources 345 to
verify the status of the issuer and the certificate itself, e.g.,
revocation rates of issuers, reputation ratings of issuers,
certificates that do not have revocation checking mechanisms or
invalid revocation checking mechanisms, or the like. That is,
services that rate issuers may be used to generate verification
resource information 345. The data collection and analysis system
340 may correlate issuer identification information in captured and
stored certificate information with these ratings of issuers and
determine statistics or analytics as to the number of connections,
temporal trends of the connections, and the like, with regard to
risky issuers or certificates.
Monitoring these trends allows administrators and managers to
demonstrate to auditors that processes have been implemented to not
only check for the existence of risky certificates (or certificates
from risky issuers) on the network but also to demonstrate
improvements in the reduction of the use of risky certificates over
time. If the organization is noted for using one or more risky
certificates by an auditing entity, a reassessment of the
certificates used at a later time should include the monitored
trends and show that the occurrence of risky certificates have been
reduced. Demonstration of this process to auditors aligns not only
with best practices but also the internal and external compliance
policies of organizations to have a process, and not just a single
measurement, of monitoring security metrics.
Furthermore, with regard to trigger analytics, the trigger is
normally triggered whenever the count exceeds 0. In theory, an
organization should no longer use certificates that have been
revoked or are from unauthorized/risky issuers once they have been
identified. In practice, large organizations may inadvertently
re-introduce certificates from a risky issuer because of a mistake
by an administrator, a change in organizational structure, merging
with another organization, or a myriad of other scenarios. Having a
triggering system can allow organizations to constantly monitor the
network for the existence of revoked (or even risky) certificates.
Fundamentally, the definite characteristic of a trigger is when a
threshold exceeds zero (or perhaps even some hard threshold that is
defined that is greater than zero). One scenario is that a system
must continue to use a risky/revoked certificate until it is
replaced (perhaps a week or month later), but does not want any
more introduced. In this scenario, a threshold of one may be
established to allow for the ongoing use of one revoked certificate
in the interim, but prevent more revoked certificates from being
introduced.
Thus, the data collection and analysis system 340 performs one or
more analysis operations to generate a result which is then
provided to a compliance auditing system 350. The compliance
auditing system 350 compares the results generated by the data
collection and analysis system 340 to a set of security
requirements 355 to determine if the data communications exchanged
with the computing device, e.g., server, are in compliance with
these security requirements or not. The security requirements 355
may be specified as one or more security policies, for example. The
security policies may be defined in terms of rules that may be run
or applied to the results generated by the data collection and
analysis system 340 with compliance results being generated
indication whether each rule is satisfied or not by the analysis
results generated by the data collection and analysis system 340,
for example.
The results of the compliance audit performed by the compliance
auditing system 350 are stored in the results/report storage 360
and/or used to generate reports, notifications, or other output to
inform an authorized user, such as a user of the administrator
computing device 370, of the degree of compliance of the server 310
with the security requirements 355. The notifications or reports
may identify violations of security requirements identified by the
analytics performed by the data collection and analysis system 340
based on the security data that is captured in a non-invasive
manner by the switched port analyzer 334 using the mirroring of
identified security data to the analysis port 336.
In some illustrative embodiments, the compliance auditing system
350 may further send commands to the switch 330 and/or server 310,
via the network 305, to automatically perform operations to
reconfigure the switch 330 and/or server 310 to tear down or block
communication connections associated with particular types of
clients 320, particular types of security data, e.g., certificates,
issuers, or the like. For example, the compliance auditing system
350, determining that a particular issuer that has a low reputation
rating is being used to gain access to the resources of the server
310, may issue a command to the switch 330 and/or server 310 to
block all future connection requests using a certificate from the
particular issuer and a corresponding notification or report may be
sent to the administrator computing device 370. Alternatively, the
switch 330 may be given commands to restrict, impede, or isolate
the traffic on a separate virtual LAN (VLAN) that prevents the
traffic from being routed to particular portions of the network or
assets within the network. This approach does not block traffic,
but protects the remainder of the enterprise network from the
traffic protected by a certificate that is in violation of security
policy due to its issuer's reputation, its own reputation,
revocation status, or risk.
While the data collection and analysis system 340 and compliance
auditing system 350 are described separately, they may in fact be
integrated with one another such that a single system comprising
elements 340-360 (possibly with element 345 being a separate
service and security requirements 355 being provided by a separate
business policy system) collects the security data from the switch
330, analyzes it, and compares it to compliance requirements,
without departing from the spirit and scope of the illustrative
embodiments.
Moreover, it should be appreciated that these operations of
collecting security data from switches 330, analyzing the collected
security data, and comparing the results of the analysis to
security requirements 355 for determination of compliance may be
performed for a plurality of computing devices with the results of
these operations being aggregated to generate an overall report,
notification, or other output, e.g., automated commands for
reconfiguration of computing devices and switches, that covers the
plurality of computing devices. For example, such operations may be
performed for computing devices across an enterprise, e.g., an
entire company, or at least a portion of the enterprise, e.g., a
division within a company. Alternatively, such operations may be
distributed to various portions of the enterprise with each
performing such operations for their own individual division,
optionally with additional centralized collection, analysis, and
compliance auditing being done across divisions at a centralized
computing system. That is, there may be separate data collection
and analysis systems 340 and compliance auditing systems 350 for
different portions of an overall enterprise. As noted above, any
architecture that facilitates the collection of security data from
switches in the manner of the illustrative embodiments, analysis of
such collected security data, and compliance auditing based on the
results of the analysis may be used without departing from the
spirit and scope of the illustrative embodiments.
As mentioned above, the mechanisms of the switched port analyzer
334 monitors traffic flowing through the switch 330 to identify
messages being passed as part of a handshake or secure connection
establishment operation. Such operations typically follow a well
defined pattern of message passing according to the particular
protocol being utilized. Thus, the switched port analyzer 334 may
monitor the messages being passed between the same two or more
computing devices and compare those messages to the established
pattern for the protocol being utilized. If the pattern of messages
passing between those computing devices matches the pattern known
to be associated with the establishment of a secure connection,
such as via a handshake operation, then the switched port analyzer
334 may trigger monitoring for particular types of messages known
to include security data of interest, e.g., certificates of the
sender (client) and receiver (server). Once those messages are
identified, the corresponding security data may be extracted and
mirrored to the analysis port 336 based on a known location of the
security data within the message.
FIG. 4 illustrates one example of a handshake operation in
accordance with the TLS protocol. As shown in FIG. 4, the TLS
protocol involves the client (sender) 410 sending a synchronization
message (SYN) to the server (receiver) 420 and the receiver 420
sending an acknowledgement back to the sender 410. The sender 410
then sends an acknowledgement and a "ClientHello" message back to
the receiver 420. This is a pattern of messaging that may be
identified by the switched port analyzer of the switch 430 as the
messages flow through the switch. Having identified the pattern as
being present, the switch 430 may then monitor the exchange of
messages between the sender 410 and the receiver 420 for a
"ServerHello" message which includes the server's certificate. If
the switch 430 sees this message flowing through the switch 430,
then the switch 430 may extract the certificate from the message
and mirror it to the analysis port for output to the data
collection and analysis system.
FIG. 5 is a flowchart outlining an example operation of a switched
port analyzer in a switch in accordance with one illustrative
embodiment. As shown in FIG. 5, the operation starts with the
receiving of data message(s) in the switch via one or more physical
and/or virtual ports which are monitored by the switched port
analyzer (step 510). The data message(s), or pattern of data
message(s), are compared to known handshake message patterns, or
otherwise analyzed for identifiers of the messages being part of a
handshake operation, e.g., header data, metadata, or message type
information indicating the message to be a handshake data message
(step 520). A determination is made as to whether there is a
handshake operation being performed between the two or more
computing devices identified in the data messages (step 530). If
not, the operation continues to step 580. If there is a handshake
operation being performed, then monitoring for certificate, or
other security data, messages is performed (step 540). A data
message is then received (step 550) and analyzed to determine if it
is a certificate message, i.e. a message of the type known to
include a certificate of the sender/receiver (step 560). If so,
then the security data, which may include the certificate,
timestamp information, identifier of the sender/receiver, and the
like, is mirrored from the identified certificate message to the
analysis port (step 570). Thereafter, if it is not a certificate
message, or if no handshake operation is being performed (step 530:
NO), then a determination is made as to whether the connection has
been terminated (step 580). If not, the operation returns to step
540 and continues to monitor for certificate messages. Otherwise
the operation terminates.
FIG. 6 is a flowchart of a system for collecting security data from
an analysis port of a switch and determining compliance of a
computing system based on the collected security data in accordance
with one illustrative embodiment. As shown in FIG. 6, the operation
starts with the receipt of security data from an analysis port of a
switch (step 610). The security data is stored (step 620) and later
analyzed to identify characteristics within the security data,
e.g., the certificate, timestamp, identifiers of sender/receiver,
information stored within the certificate, and the like (step 630).
Counters associated with the identified characteristics are
incremented in accordance with the types of metrics measured by the
counters (step 640) and analytical values are generated based on an
analysis of the counters and the characteristics of the security
data (step 650). The analytical values are provided to the
compliance auditing system (step 660) which compares the analytical
values to security requirements to determine compliance (step 670).
The results of the compliance auditing are stored and appropriate
reports, notifications, and automated commands are generated and
output based on the compliance audit reports (step 680). The
operation then terminates.
It can be seen from the above, that the illustrative embodiments
provide a non-intrusive security monitoring solution that does not
require active probing of an institution's networked machines or
ongoing modifications to maintain the monitoring capabilities. The
mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments provide for passive
monitoring of flows through switches or other routing/communication
devices between computing devices for identifiable patterns of
messages and security data. In response to identifying such message
and security data, the mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments
mirror the desired security data to an analysis port which outputs
the captured security data to a data collection and analysis
system. In this way, the flows through the switch are not impeded
and yet necessary security data for measuring compliance with
security requirements is obtained. Various analyses may then be
performed on the captured security data and application of security
requirements may be performed on the results of the analyses to
determine compliance with security requirements.
As noted above, it should be appreciated that the illustrative
embodiments may take the form of an entirely hardware embodiment,
an entirely software embodiment or an embodiment containing both
hardware and software elements. In one example embodiment, the
mechanisms of the illustrative embodiments are implemented in
software or program code, which includes but is not limited to
firmware, resident software, microcode, etc.
A data processing system suitable for storing and/or executing
program code will include at least one processor coupled directly
or indirectly to memory elements through a system bus. The memory
elements can include local memory employed during actual execution
of the program code, bulk storage, and cache memories which provide
temporary storage of at least some program code in order to reduce
the number of times code must be retrieved from bulk storage during
execution.
Input/output or I/O devices (including but not limited to
keyboards, displays, pointing devices, etc.) can be coupled to the
system either directly or through intervening I/O controllers.
Network adapters may also be coupled to the system to enable the
data processing system to become coupled to other data processing
systems or remote printers or storage devices through intervening
private or public networks. Modems, cable modems and Ethernet cards
are just a few of the currently available types of network
adapters.
The description of the present invention has been presented for
purposes of illustration and description, and is not intended to be
exhaustive or limited to the invention in the form disclosed. Many
modifications and variations will be apparent to those of ordinary
skill in the art without departing from the scope and spirit of the
described embodiments. The embodiment was chosen and described in
order to best explain the principles of the invention, the
practical application, and to enable others of ordinary skill in
the art to understand the invention for various embodiments with
various modifications as are suited to the particular use
contemplated. The terminology used herein was chosen to best
explain the principles of the embodiments, the practical
application or technical improvement over technologies found in the
marketplace, or to enable others of ordinary skill in the art to
understand the embodiments disclosed herein.
* * * * *
References